Thursday, November 20 - Housekeepers at the Harvard-owned Doubletree by Hilton Boston-Cambridge in Allston are on strike today. It is the first strike of housekeepers in Boston’s history. Harvard housekeepers say Harvard profits from its hotel—$22.6 million in 2012—while workers have confronted pain and sometimes debilitating injuries.

Last week IWW member Colin was fired from his job as a baker at Insomnia Cookies in Harvard Square. A trained organizer, Colin was working to unionize the company, which has been dogged by charges of racism, wage theft, failure to provide breaks and retaliation against union activists. Last year Insomnia was forced to pay back wages to four IWW members illegally fired for striking. Colin is the sixth IWW member unfairly fired by the company in less than two years.

Today Wobblies from Boston took to the street to support Portland OR canvassers, employed by Grassroots Campaigns Inc (GCI), who formed the United Campaign Workers* union in response to poverty pay, impossible quotas, meager training, and blatant disrespect. Canvassers’ demands included $15/hr, overtime pay, and sick leave. The company retaliated by shutting down its Portland operation, laying off employees with no notice and just two days’ wages!

Yesterday IWW’s who are members of HUCTW (the Harvard Union of Clerical & Technical Workers) helped organize an action at the world’s richest University’s Commencement Exercises. The Student Labor Action Movement (SLAM) helped us build for the event, and mobilized their members to turn out. SLAM has been fiercely defending campus workers for many years.

The following article is by Lucy Parsons. She was a comrade of Haymarket martyr Albert Parsons. The article first appeared in the Labor Defender in November 1926. The Labor Defender was a newspaper of the International Labor Defense, a working class defense organization tied to the early American Communist Party.